Conner44:
This stuff happens mostly on the highway. If it's your first time coming upon such a motorcade you'd obviously want to overtake them and then have an experience.

First time this stuff happened to me was from onitsha to agbor. 3 hilux only with like 4 guys in the last vehicle, spreading across the full free road just driving anyhow. At first when we got to a hill facing upwards I saw my chance and married the edge of the right side of the road and gunned the pedal.

Those vehicles immediately started doing the zig zaging and I instinctively matched brake pedal in order not to hit their bumper swearing furiously in my mind at the driver only to look up and discover that all of the guys on the back had since raised and were pointing their guns directly at me in a very threatening manner.

I just chop the humble pie with my overloaded 3mz sienna and followed them at 70kmph from then onwards till they branched off the highway. One particular one of them will sometimes stand up and raise his gun pointing it at me and start shaking it, gesturing like he's saying PA - PA - PA (like how kids do when they point sticks at each other and jerk it to signify shots being fired) The guy did it to me like four times along that journey.

I just dey watch am from like around 8 to 10 cars back dey hide my face. It is only those who seldom travel by road that haven't encountered these type of things.

Kelvin30286063:

It's a 3.7L engine and a 340HP. It's quite fast and revs like a monster truck. I feel like maybe that intimidated the policemen a little bit too cos as soon as I switched to sport mode and gear down with my pedal shifter, the engine revved and the speed was lightning. I would have overtaken all 3 of them within 3 to 5 seconds if they didn't start that zig zag movement.

checky619:
There is absolutely nothing wrong in over taking a convoy that’s not moving at a fast pace except it’s a presidential, governor or military convoy. it’s just the way you do it, i over take any form of convoy I meet on the road and nothing has ever happened. in defensive driving, if you want to over take a convoy make sure your vehicle is capable of running really fast next time don’t bother flashing them or getting close to them, flashing them will raise suspicions. Floor your throttle and pass them with a lighting speed (160kmh or more) don’t slow down next to them or get close behind them before over taking, just floor your throttle and pass nothing will happen. They are also humans and believe you’ve somewhere very important to go.

NOTE: I won’t suggest you try this with a not so fast car or a car without heavy torque, if you near them too much problem for you.

kingreign:


Your car is NOT a 340hp. It's a 300Hp.
It's also not very impressive at its acceleration at 8.1 seconds 0-60mph.

Back to the topic, YOU PUT YOUR LIFE AND THAT OF YOUR FAMILY through grave danger. Never attempt that ever in the future. Many never lived to tell the stories.
There's no such laws that allows such lawlessness on the part of the convoy, but common sense and safety reasons 101 dictates you try to stay alive even if it means you missing an appointment cos the country is trying hard to kill you.

Kelvin30286063:

Do not try this. Don't take this man's advice cos he obviously hasn't experienced what I did.
1. My car is really fast and can pedal shift which means I have great control of the gears.
2. You can't attempt to race pass a Convoy, it becomes more dangerous if they feel threatened due to your reckless driving.
3. Do no attempt to race past a Convoy cos if you hit top speed and they start that zig zag movement to stop you from overtaking, you will either end up in the bush or hit them, then there's a 90% chance you'll be shot.
4. Policemen are not humans. Know that and stay safe.

One was literally rigging of alcohol, he was the most aggressive and I was legit scared that he may shoot due to his drunken state.
Please don't advice people to try those things you just mentioned. None of them will work in that situation unless they want you to go cos as soon as you attempt to overtake, they will start moving zig zag and try to push you off the road.

checky619:



Your car is not really fast! You drive an Acura zdx with 300hp, and you clearly don’t even know how to handle it, the zig zag movement is because you were too close to them and they saw you as a threat with your tinted glass, still flashing them from behind… my advice is not for novice drivers like you but for experienced and professionals who know how to handle a machine and really wants to pass a convoy for an emergency purpose without having any issue with them.

Kelvin30286063:
On Wednesday 6th of December, I was driving my family from Ondo to Akure to launch a new business.

We plan to start the event at 12 and it was already past 11am so I was rushing. Along Akure road, I saw this three police convoy going in front but they were not very fast.

I have a really fast car so I was like, I should overtake them and be on my way, I flashed the last pickup with about 3 policemen at the back but they didn't make any reaction and didn't gesture for me to go.

The road ahead of us was long and free, no incoming vehicles so I saw it as an opportunity.

After flashing twice again and no response, I decided to overtake all three pickup vehicles quickly so I switched to sport mode and decided to use my pedal shifter to go faster.

As soon as I revved and started overtaking them, they went crazy and started driving zig-zag on the road leaving me absolutely no room to go.

At the end they ran me into the nearly bush and parked me off. One of them decided to use their vehicles to intentionally brush my car while parking me off the road. They all came down, almost 20 of them and started shooting in the air.

They started shouting come down from this car! Hitting my car everywhere with fist and hitting my glass with the tail of their guns. Somehow my window didn't break even after they hit them 5 or 6 times. (Respect to Acura on that)

One of them pointed his gun at my vehicle and was about to shoot. I roll down my glass and started begging them.

My wife was sitting in front with me and my 2 year old daughter was sitting at the back in the hand of a friend we took along with us to act as MC for the occasion.

My wife quickly collected my daughter from the guy and held her to her chest cos she was already panicking and crying.

I think that was what saved our live cos as soon as they saw my daughter, somehow they calm down a little and started trying to drag me out of the car.

I vehemently refused to go down cos I know I will be beaten or even shot. After a few minutes of acting upset, shooting in the air, one of them that was fat and looks like their leader came down from the middle van.

That was the first time I noticed that the middle van was actually covered at the back which means they may be carrying something. They didn't use a bullion van so there was no indication that they were moving money and they didn't use siren either.

Long story short, the big guy that looked like the boss came to me and said why did I overtake them.

I explained that we were in a hurry and I flashed a few times before I attempted to overtake them and I also saw that the road was clear.

He looked at me, looked at my wife, looked at my crying daughter and looked at the guy at the back then asked me to come down that nothing will happen to me, I took my company's ID card and my guy at the back and I came down.

He checked the ID and said don't do that again. The others were shouting he must follow us to the station bla bla bla but he was calm.

Eventually they let us go.

They damaged the bumper of my vehicle in the process.

I know I was in the wrong by overtaking them without anyone gesturing that I can go but seriously, WHAT IS THE RULE TO THAT?
Especially on highway, with a wider road and not within the city.

I had to apologise to my family later cos I know it was a traumatic experience for them and I accepted my fault but I'm still confused on how I was wrong. The road was straight, long, clear of incoming vehicles and I flashed and horned.

Are we expected to follow convoy from wherever we see them to where ever they are going even if they are driving at 80km per hr?

naptu2:
Shepherds and Keep Back

I watched an interview that Keefe D gave and it reminded me of something that I have written briefly about. It's the shepherds and keep back.

Shepherds

I didn't notice the shepherds until the late 1980s, but they have almost always existed. I remember that President Shagari had motorcycle escorts, but that's kind of different. I guess the reason I didn't notice the shepherds was that almost all the vehicles in the presidential motorcade during the early part of President Babangida's era were Peugeot 504s.

I later noticed that there were usually 4 Peugeot 504 vehicles that surrounded the state car.

This became much clearer around 1990.

Nigeria had an agreement with Steyr in the late 1970s and 1980s. Steyr established a plant in Bauchi where they assembled military vehicles for the Nigerian Armed Forces and Police and tractors and other agricultural vehicles for farmers. They provided a lot of Pinzgauers to the military and police and a lot of Puch G-Wagens to the Presidency.

Steyr Magna Puch of Austria is the maker of the G-Wagen. They make G-Wagen for Mercedes Benz (Daimler Benz had a lot of shares in Steyr). All G-Wagens are now branded as Mercedes Benz vehicles, but back in the 1980s and early 1990s there were G-Wagens that were branded as Puch. The Presidency got a lot of Puch G-Wagens during the Shagari era.

The Puch G-Wagens were mainly kept at CVU after Shagari was removed from office. Then, c1990, the Babangida administration brought them out and restored them to the presidential motorcade. The Puch G-Wagens were used as shepherds.

You would see 4 Puch G-Wagens surrounding the presidential limousine (a Peugeot 505 stretch limousine or a W100 Mercedes Benz 600).

By 1991 the Land Rover Discovery had become the official shepherd. These duties were mainly performed by either Land Rover Discovery or Land Cruiser Prado SUVs in the 1990s and early 2000s.

Things changed in the Yar'Adua era. President Yar'Adua used Mercedes Benz W221 S Class cars as his official vehicles, so the SSS used President Obasanjo's old W140 S Class cars as shepherds. I guess they wanted something faster than an SUV and something that would make the presidential car blend in.

Keep Back

They don't use Shepherds in the UK, instead they use another interesting feature that is also used here.

The last vehicle in the UK Prime Minister’s motorcade is usually a police Range Rover and the Metropolitan Police Range Rover has an LED display at its back window and the display usually has the words, “Keep back” or “Keep clear” written on it. This means that you are not allowed to overtake the motorcade. It’s the same for the King’s motorcade and the motorcades of visiting leaders.

Let’s come back to Nigeria. Have you ever tried overtaking the CBN convoy? You probably wouldn’t even try it.

That reminds me of an old Nairaland thread from around 2008 or 2009. A Nairalander created a thread to complain that he was driving down the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway when he came upon the motorcade of the deputy governor of Ogun State. He felt that the motorcade was going to slowly, so he tried to overtake it, but policemen in the motorcade warned him not to. He wanted to insist, but he got a stern warning from the policemen.

He came to complain on Nairaland that there was no reason for the policemen to prevent him from overtaking the motorcade. Someone told him that you could not overtake Barack Obama’s motorcade in the US (where the person lived) but the first guy asked him how he could compare the Ogun State deputy governor to Barack Obama.

Keefe D
There was a little war of words between Reggie Wright Jnr, a former police officer and head of security at Death Row Records and Gene Deal, who was Sean Puffy Combs’bodyguard. Gene Deal seemed to criticise Reggie when he asked how Reggie allowed Tupac to get killed. Gene Deal criticised the security arrangement at the time that Tupac was shot and he seemed to agree with the rumour mongers that say that Reggie must have had something to do with Tupac’s death.

In response Reggie asked how the Notorious BIG was killed. It was the exact same situation, a drive by shooting. Reggie asked, so where was Gene Deal when Biggie was killed?

They asked Keefe D if Biggie would have been killed if he was providing security at the time. As I told you, Keefe D was a plug. If you needed anything in the hood, he would provide it. He originally met Puffy when Puffy needed a certain type of vehicle for a music video. Keefe D provided the vehicle. Keefe D also sometimes provided security for Puffy and his crew when they came to Los Angeles. He was a senior member of the South Side Compton Crips and gang members affiliated to Keefe D often provided security for Puffy.

Keefe had previously said that he met Puffy on the day that Biggie was killed. He said that Puffy had sent him invitations to the party, but that night, when he and his crew met Puffy, Puffy told them that the Feds had been following him and his crew and he didn’t want Keefe D to catch any heat (that is, he didn’t want the feds that were following him to become interested in Keefe D). Keefe D said that he had asked Puffy about the money for killing Tupac, but Puffy said not now, because the feds were monitoring them. Puffy gave them bottles of Champagne and they went across the street to drink.

Keefe said that Biggie would not have been killed if he was providing security because they would have flooded the lanes.

Do you understand what he meant?

Let’s go back to the beginning of this post. That’s exactly what the shepherds do. They occupy all the lanes beside the presidential limousine, so that no vehicle can get alongside the limousine and open fire on it. They shield the limousine.

Similarly, the reason for the message on the Metropolitan Police Range Rover and the reason you can’t overtake a CBN convoy is to prevent you from being able to get alongside the vehicle they are guarding and open fire on it.

Picture 1-4 below: Land Rover Discovery SUVs protecting the W124 Mercedes Benz 6 door stretch limousine carrying General Abdulsalami Abubakar and Colonel Mohammed Buba Marwa.

Picture 5: Metropolitan Police Range Rover guarding Prime Minister Liz Truss’ official vehicle. You can see the “Keep back” sign.

Kelvin30286063:
On Wednesday 6th of December, I was driving my family from Ondo to Akure to launch a new business.

We plan to start the event at 12 and it was already past 11am so I was rushing. Along Akure road, I saw this three police convoy going in front but they were not very fast.

I have a really fast car so I was like, I should overtake them and be on my way, I flashed the last pickup with about 3 policemen at the back but they didn't make any reaction and didn't gesture for me to go.

The road ahead of us was long and free, no incoming vehicles so I saw it as an opportunity.

After flashing twice again and no response, I decided to overtake all three pickup vehicles quickly so I switched to sport mode and decided to use my pedal shifter to go faster.

As soon as I revved and started overtaking them, they went crazy and started driving zig-zag on the road leaving me absolutely no room to go.

At the end they ran me into the nearly bush and parked me off. One of them decided to use their vehicles to intentionally brush my car while parking me off the road. They all came down, almost 20 of them and started shooting in the air.

They started shouting come down from this car! Hitting my car everywhere with fist and hitting my glass with the tail of their guns. Somehow my window didn't break even after they hit them 5 or 6 times. (Respect to Acura on that)

One of them pointed his gun at my vehicle and was about to shoot. I roll down my glass and started begging them.

My wife was sitting in front with me and my 2 year old daughter was sitting at the back in the hand of a friend we took along with us to act as MC for the occasion.

My wife quickly collected my daughter from the guy and held her to her chest cos she was already panicking and crying.

I think that was what saved our live cos as soon as they saw my daughter, somehow they calm down a little and started trying to drag me out of the car.

I vehemently refused to go down cos I know I will be beaten or even shot. After a few minutes of acting upset, shooting in the air, one of them that was fat and looks like their leader came down from the middle van.

That was the first time I noticed that the middle van was actually covered at the back which means they may be carrying something. They didn't use a bullion van so there was no indication that they were moving money and they didn't use siren either.

Long story short, the big guy that looked like the boss came to me and said why did I overtake them.

I explained that we were in a hurry and I flashed a few times before I attempted to overtake them and I also saw that the road was clear.

He looked at me, looked at my wife, looked at my crying daughter and looked at the guy at the back then asked me to come down that nothing will happen to me, I took my company's ID card and my guy at the back and I came down.

He checked the ID and said don't do that again. The others were shouting he must follow us to the station bla bla bla but he was calm.

Eventually they let us go.

They damaged the bumper of my vehicle in the process.

I know I was in the wrong by overtaking them without anyone gesturing that I can go but seriously, WHAT IS THE RULE TO THAT?
Especially on highway, with a wider road and not within the city.

I had to apologise to my family later cos I know it was a traumatic experience for them and I accepted my fault but I'm still confused on how I was wrong. The road was straight, long, clear of incoming vehicles and I flashed and horned.

Are we expected to follow convoy from wherever we see them to where ever they are going even if they are driving at 80km per hr?

Kelvin30286063:
On Wednesday 6th of December, I was driving my family from Ondo to Akure to launch a new business.

We plan to start the event at 12 and it was already past 11am so I was rushing. Along Akure road, I saw this three police convoy going in front but they were not very fast.

I have a really fast car so I was like, I should overtake them and be on my way, I flashed the last pickup with about 3 policemen at the back but they didn't make any reaction and didn't gesture for me to go.

The road ahead of us was long and free, no incoming vehicles so I saw it as an opportunity.

After flashing twice again and no response, I decided to overtake all three pickup vehicles quickly so I switched to sport mode and decided to use my pedal shifter to go faster.

As soon as I revved and started overtaking them, they went crazy and started driving zig-zag on the road leaving me absolutely no room to go.

At the end they ran me into the nearly bush and parked me off. One of them decided to use their vehicles to intentionally brush my car while parking me off the road. They all came down, almost 20 of them and started shooting in the air.

They started shouting come down from this car! Hitting my car everywhere with fist and hitting my glass with the tail of their guns. Somehow my window didn't break even after they hit them 5 or 6 times. (Respect to Acura on that)

One of them pointed his gun at my vehicle and was about to shoot. I roll down my glass and started begging them.

My wife was sitting in front with me and my 2 year old daughter was sitting at the back in the hand of a friend we took along with us to act as MC for the occasion.

My wife quickly collected my daughter from the guy and held her to her chest cos she was already panicking and crying.

I think that was what saved our live cos as soon as they saw my daughter, somehow they calm down a little and started trying to drag me out of the car.

I vehemently refused to go down cos I know I will be beaten or even shot. After a few minutes of acting upset, shooting in the air, one of them that was fat and looks like their leader came down from the middle van.

That was the first time I noticed that the middle van was actually covered at the back which means they may be carrying something. They didn't use a bullion van so there was no indication that they were moving money and they didn't use siren either.

Long story short, the big guy that looked like the boss came to me and said why did I overtake them.

I explained that we were in a hurry and I flashed a few times before I attempted to overtake them and I also saw that the road was clear.

He looked at me, looked at my wife, looked at my crying daughter and looked at the guy at the back then asked me to come down that nothing will happen to me, I took my company's ID card and my guy at the back and I came down.

He checked the ID and said don't do that again. The others were shouting he must follow us to the station bla bla bla but he was calm.

Eventually they let us go.

They damaged the bumper of my vehicle in the process.

I know I was in the wrong by overtaking them without anyone gesturing that I can go but seriously, WHAT IS THE RULE TO THAT?
Especially on highway, with a wider road and not within the city.

I had to apologise to my family later cos I know it was a traumatic experience for them and I accepted my fault but I'm still confused on how I was wrong. The road was straight, long, clear of incoming vehicles and I flashed and horned.

Are we expected to follow convoy from wherever we see them to where ever they are going even if they are driving at 80km per hr?

slan87:
Thank your stars for standing by with you, good you already accepted the blame for the whole scenario.

My advice is for you is just to be patience in anything you find yourself doing, that's the only rule of law I know in Nigeria

checky619:



Your car is not really fast! You drive an Acura zdx with 300hp, and you clearly don’t even know how to handle it, the zig zag movement is because you were too close to them and they saw you as a threat with your tinted glass, still flashing them from behind… my advice is not for novice drivers like you but for experienced and professionals who know how to handle a machine and really wants to pass a convoy for an emergency purpose without having any issue with them.